Barack Obama’s
repeated insistence that Bashar al-Assad must leave office – and that
there are ‘moderate’ rebel groups in Syria capable of defeating him –
has in recent years provoked quiet dissent, and even overt opposition,
among some of the most senior officers on the Pentagon’s Joint Staff.
Their criticism has focused on what they see as the administration’s
fixation on Assad’s primary ally, Vladimir Putin. In their view, Obama
is captive to Cold War thinking about Russia and China, and hasn’t
adjusted his stance on Syria to the fact both countries share
Washington’s anxiety about the spread of terrorism in and beyond Syria;
like Washington, they believe that Islamic State must be stopped.

The military’s resistance dates back to the summer of 2013, when a
highly classified assessment, put together by the Defense Intelligence
Agency (DIA) and the Joint Chiefs of Staff, then led by General Martin
Dempsey, forecast that the fall of the Assad regime would lead to chaos
and, potentially, to Syria’s takeover by jihadi extremists, much as was
then happening in Libya. A former senior adviser to the Joint Chiefs
told me that the document was an ‘all-source’ appraisal, drawing on
information from signals, satellite and human intelligence, and took a
dim view of the Obama administration’s insistence on continuing to
finance and arm the so-called moderate rebel groups. By then, the CIA
had been conspiring for more than a year with allies in the UK, Saudi
Arabia and Qatar to ship guns and goods – to be used for the overthrow
of Assad – from Libya, via Turkey, into Syria. The new intelligence
estimate singled out Turkey as a major impediment to Obama’s Syria
policy. The document showed, the adviser said, ‘that what was started as
a covert US programme to arm and support the moderate rebels fighting
Assad had been co-opted by Turkey, and had morphed into an
across-the-board technical, arms and logistical programme for all of the
opposition, including Jabhat al-Nusra and Islamic State. The so-called
moderates had evaporated and the Free Syrian Army was a rump group
stationed at an airbase in Turkey.’ The assessment was bleak: there was
no viable ‘moderate’ opposition to Assad, and the US was arming
extremists.

Lieutenant General Michael Flynn, director of the DIA
between 2012 and 2014, confirmed that his agency had sent a constant
stream of classified warnings to the civilian leadership about the dire
consequences of toppling Assad. The jihadists, he said, were in control
of the opposition. Turkey wasn’t doing enough to stop the smuggling of
foreign fighters and weapons across the border. ‘If the American public
saw the intelligence we were producing daily, at the most sensitive
level, they would go ballistic,’ Flynn told me. ‘We understood Isis’s
long-term strategy and its campaign plans, and we also discussed the
fact that Turkey was looking the other way when it came to the growth of
the Islamic State inside Syria.’ The DIA’s reporting, he said, ‘got
enormous pushback’ from the Obama administration. ‘I felt that they did
not want to hear the truth.’

‘Our policy of arming the opposition
to Assad was unsuccessful and actually having a negative impact,’ the
former JCS adviser said. ‘The Joint Chiefs believed that Assad should
not be replaced by fundamentalists. The administration’s policy was
contradictory. They wanted Assad to go but the opposition was dominated
by extremists. So who was going to replace him? To say Assad’s got to go
is fine, but if you follow that through – therefore anyone is better.
It’s the “anybody else is better” issue that the JCS had with Obama’s
policy.’

But what's more shocking is what the Joint Chiefs decided to do about it.

The Joint Chiefs felt that a direct challenge to Obama’s policy would
have ‘had a zero chance of success’. So in the autumn of 2013 they
decided to take steps against the extremists without going through
political channels, by providing US intelligence to the militaries of
other nations, on the understanding that it would be passed on to the
Syrian army and used against the common enemy, Jabhat al-Nusra and
Islamic State.

Germany, Israel and Russia were in contact with the
Syrian army, and able to exercise some influence over Assad’s decisions
– it was through them that US intelligence would be shared. Each had
its reasons for co-operating with Assad: Germany feared what might
happen among its own population of six million Muslims if Islamic State
expanded; Israel was concerned with border security; Russia had an
alliance of very long standing with Syria, and was worried by the threat
to its only naval base on the Mediterranean, at Tartus. ‘We weren’t
intent on deviating from Obama’s stated policies,’ the adviser said.
‘But sharing our assessments via the military-to-military relationships
with other countries could prove productive. It was clear that Assad
needed better tactical intelligence and operational advice. The JCS
concluded that if those needs were met, the overall fight against
Islamist terrorism would be enhanced. Obama didn’t know, but Obama
doesn’t know what the JCS does in every circumstance and that’s true of
all presidents.’

Once the flow of US intelligence began, Germany,
Israel and Russia started passing on information about the whereabouts
and intent of radical jihadist groups to the Syrian army; in return,
Syria provided information about its own capabilities and intentions.
There was no direct contact between the US and the Syrian military;
instead, the adviser said, ‘we provided the information – including
long-range analyses on Syria’s future put together by contractors or one
of our war colleges – and these countries could do with it what they
chose, including sharing it with Assad. We were saying to the Germans
and the others: “Here’s some information that’s pretty interesting and
our interest is mutual.” End of conversation. The JCS could conclude
that something beneficial would arise from it – but it was a military to
military thing, and not some sort of a sinister Joint Chiefs’ plot to
go around Obama and support Assad. It was a lot cleverer than that. If
Assad remains in power, it will not be because we did it. It’s because
he was smart enough to use the intelligence and sound tactical advice we
provided to others.’

2 Comments:

All things equal, what does the gist of it say about the quality of the present-day US Armed Forces top command? My personal best guess is that all the good ones are gone. CentCom/MacDill is likely a pack of syncophants and clock-punchers.

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I am an Orthodox Jew - some would even call me 'ultra-Orthodox.' Born in Boston, I was a corporate and securities attorney in New York City for seven years before making aliya to Israel in 1991 (I don't look it but I really am that old :-). I have been happily married to the same woman for thirty-five years, and we have eight children (bli ayin hara) ranging in age from 13 to 33 years and nine grandchildren. Four of our children are married! Before I started blogging I was a heavy contributor on a number of email lists and ran an email list called the Matzav from 2000-2004. You can contact me at: IsraelMatzav at gmail dot com